Science and Inquiry discussion

For August 2019 we will be reading Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst.

Please use this thread to post questions, comments, and reviews, at any time.

Cool! I have it on my shelf already! Maybe this time I can coordinate with the group. lol

I listened to the audiobook version and I think it is wonderful! It is filled with stories that make the concepts come to life. Here is my review.

I'm a couple of chapters in, and am enjoying it. Read Appendix 1, as recommended, and found it difficult but very interesting. It describes how neurons send messages, some stimulating and some inhibitory .... I was not aware of this. It's complicated, but fascinating.

The subject matter is sometimes daunting. .. neurons, hormones, confusing acronyms galore (hippocampal LTP, LTD, NCAM, BNST, BLA--don't ask me, I can't keep em srraight)...but this guy is FUNNY! In the chapter "Adolescence, or Dude, Where's My Frontal Cortex?" he comments "...neurobiology suggests that adolescence is real, that the adolescent brain is not merely a half-cooked adult brain or a child's brain left unrefrigerated for too long. "
Regarding our society's strong desires to hang on to youth, he notes, "Hunter-gatherers aren't interested in "LOOK 10 YEARS YOUNGER! They want to look like elders, so they can boss everyone around."

Nancy wrote: "The subject matter is sometimes daunting. .. neurons, hormones, confusing acronyms galore (hippocampal LTP, LTD, NCAM, BNST, BLA--don't ask me, I can't keep em srraight)...but this guy is FUNNY! In..."

OMG, gotta get going on that! Thanks for the laughs.

only about 1/2 way through! This is a heavy one, and an eye-opener. He discusses "behavioral immunity :" "the ability of numerous species to detect cues of illness in other individuals. ..implicit cues about infectious disease make people more xenophobic. ..historical prevalence of infectious disease predicts a culture's openess to outsiders. ..other predictions other cultural tightness include having high historical incidence of pandemics, of high infant and child mortality rates, and of higher cumulative average number of years lost to communicable disease. "
Makes perfect sense but I must confess, this never occurred to me.

Well it is September and Genome is still untouched because Behave is so fat. I am still really enjoying it, though. I have 2 complaints. One is, it is loaded with footnotes, and the footnotes are in such tiny print that I have trouble seeing them even WITH my glasses on.
I also got very frustrated at all the acronyms the author uses. I'm on page 434 and in just this one page he is talking about STG, PFC, and dlPFC ... also always talking about vlPFC and SCO and RWA and vmPFC etc....finally just today I figured out the there is a glossary in the back of the book which defines all the abbreviations. That will make it a lot easier!
Even though it is very science-y, the it colorfully written and the author has a fun sense of humor, so that although sometimes the material is complicated, the book is never boring.

Geez am I the only one, other than David, to read this book? It's long but worth it ... it's fascinating. I'm on the chapter on morality, and the author points out that The Golden Rule has near-universal versions, but "Amid the power of its simplicity, the Golden Rule does to incorporate people differing as to what they would/wouldn't want don't to them; we have entered complicated terrain when we can make sense of an interchange when a masochists says, "Beat me," and the sadist sadistically answers, "No."
Good point. One would not offer a diabetic a king sized hot fudge sundae, nor would one assume that one's cat might enjoy as ride on ones Harley or that Grandma would adore a pet tarantula, no matter how cool these sound to oneself.

I finished it last year and it took me 5 months to read. I think its more like a textbook and even though ive studied those topics a bit the abbreviations totally went over my head. brain structure chapter was just overkill. the rest is more accessible.

I'm glad I'm not the only one. You'd think with as many books about the brain that I've read I could keep all that stuff straight, but it is just a jumble. Although finding that glossery at the back of the book helped a lot!

An amazing book in my opinion, and I love Robert Sapolsky’s writing style. It was a little heavy for me in places, with many names of brain regions and biological processes that made me realise how little I know about such things, but it did not reduce my fascination, and interest of the subjects being scrutinised.

I am finding as the book progresses it is less difficult. The author's wit is, pardon the cliche, sparkling. Here's one of his comments regarding Free Will: "One thing I'm not going anywhere near is this New Age-y notion: "Of course we have free will. You can't say that our behaviors are determined by a mechanistic universe, because the universe is indeterminate, because of quantum mechanics. " Argh. What anyone sensible who has thought about this will point out that (a) the consequences of subatomic indeterminacy of quantum physics (about which I understand zero) don't ripple upward enough to influence behavior, and (b) if they did, the result wouldn't be the freedom to will your behavior. It would be the utter randomization of behavior. In the words of philosopher /neuroscientist Sam Harris, a free will trasher, if quantum mechanics actually played a role in any of this, "Every thought and action would seem to merit the statement, I don't know what came over me." Except you wouldn't actually be able to make the statement, since you'd just be making gargly sounds because the muscles in your tongue would be doing all sorts of random things."
Well! I never thought about it that way, altho it seems so obvious! I guess he told THEM.